


The Line that Marks the Start

by InfiniteCalm



Series: Soundings [4]
Category: Downton Abbey
Genre: Dancing, M/M, Sharing a House, for all the tru fans, needlework samplers as a sign of affection, now with bonus material
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-01
Updated: 2020-09-23
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:21:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24497866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InfiniteCalm/pseuds/InfiniteCalm
Summary: Thomas pushes back the furniture. Richard learns the quickstep.
Relationships: Thomas Barrow/Richard Ellis
Series: Soundings [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1593997
Comments: 24
Kudos: 80





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> for everyone who's been having a hard time lately <3 
> 
> this is a short epilogue to the soundings series and a mediation on dancing, which seems to be en vogue these days in the fandom..... any similarities are literally coincidental. i haven't forgotten about the other one i'm working on but this is finished now, so.
> 
> title from laura marling's "for you" - "love is not an answer, it's the line that marks the start."

1933

Here, now, they can dance without the risk of being caught. It’s not the same rush as in the shadier areas of London’s underground, not that he could risk that too often, and not that it was ever all that it promised to be. Always the threat of detection; always the knowledge that nobody was ever telling the whole truth.

“No, no, like this,” Thomas says, demonstrating the footwork again. “Look, you need to kind of turn your foot.”

Richard comes down early to breakfast to find Thomas, humming to himself and spinning around in the parlour, all the furniture pushed up against the wall. The source of the noise that had woken him, then. Thomas didn’t ask to do that, Richard thinks crossly, but checks the impulse.

He doesn’t have to ask. That’s the whole point. And it’s lovely, coming down to a man in a newly-pressed shirt on a dark and wet Monday morning, even if he does have curious taste in interior decoration.

He stands in the doorway for a little while, watching Thomas concentrate on the steps, before giving himself away by yawning loudly; he sees through his bleary eyes Thomas give a start.

“What you doing, then?”

“Quickstep,” Thomas says, and Richard is pleased to note he is not blushing. “Thought it was about time I learned this one. Come here and help.”

He shows Richard the basic steps, and they don’t seem that difficult, so he decides to stick it out. When he goes over to Thomas, he’s surprised to feel hands immediately land on his waist, and to feel Thomas lean back, a little. Richard is leading, then, though nobody could say he was particularly worthy of it. The steps are too similar to things he already knows, but different enough to trip him up.

“Can’t we just stick to the foxtrot? I’m not bad at foxtrot,” he complains. “anyway, we’re a little old for this, aren’t we?”

Thomas sighs melodramatically and raises his hands in mock-surrender. Richard misses them, the ghost heat lingering where his belt meets his shirt.

“We’re not _too old_ to dance, Richard,” he says, “and this one is good once you get it. You just need to feel for the rhythm.”

“Feel for the rhythm, he says. As if anyone could do it.”

Thomas looks at him like Richard imagines he looked at members of staff who weren’t pulling their weight.

“Oh, come on. Once more, then we’ll leave it, or we’ll be late,” Richard says, and a gust of wind splatters rain against the window. He doesn’t want to leave this house, with its yellow light and full bookshelves… one thing about having a place of your own is that you do have to keep on leaving to go to work, which is pretty much as bad as people say it is.

Of course, only leaving your place of employment once a month is much worse. And leaving means he gets to come home again, and if there’s a better feeling, he hasn’t found it yet.

If Richard doesn’t shut up about the joys of hearth and family, Thomas says he’ll put Sibbie Branson’s needlework samplers above the fireplace (“Home is where the Heart is!” is her painstaking latest, enclosed with a sweet note from her and a more confused one from her father). Richard hopes he does put the sampler up. He thinks that Thomas is only looking for an excuse.

“Now,” Thomas says, showing with exaggerated slowness the correct place way to place his foot. “You can do the foxtrot, you can do this.”

Richard huffs, but as Thomas begins to count them in he decides to take it seriously, and he’s glad he does, because he gets it, suddenly, the dance clicks, and then they’re off – Thomas anticipating his movements, in time with each other, swooping fast around the parlour; knowing where the next foot will go, and in what direction the other will turn. A bit analytical, and a bit instinctual.

Richard’s heart is beating in his chest, and Thomas’ eager eyes follow his, face young and bright. On a turn, then, Richard’s foot catches the edge of the sofa and it breaks the rhythm; they stop, and Richard is surprised to find himself winded. Thomas moves his hands. Richard feels arms around his back, and moves to return the embrace. Thomas’ heart is fast against Richard’s chest, and his breath is unsteady. Richard rubs his back until they’re both still. The stillness is almost as strange as the sudden dexterity of the dance.

But the clock chimes (the clock always chimes, or the bell always rings, there’s always a problem to be solved) and Richard really has to go soon; he grabs his lunch and his umbrella. Thomas is cheerfully beginning to get set up in his waterproofs (unlucky bastard; good thing the cycle in isn’t a long one) and Richard kisses him on the cheek before he opens the door.

“Goodbye, darling,” he murmurs, as the door opens. Richard doesn’t delude himself into thinking it’s his mere presence that has unearthed the smile; he simply returns the goodbye and opens the umbrella.

It’s nice to commute and know that Thomas is doing the same; two hearts moving together, through the same town, in different directions.

1932 [epilogue]

“Something’s got to give,” Thomas said. “This isn’t how I want us to go on. I want to live here, with you. Daisy’s moved out, you know? After she called it all off. Daisy’s living her life. We’re going to live ours.”

Richard felt like someone had just plucked a string in his chest he didn’t know was there. Joy, he thought, or something like it, moved his hand to Thomas’ cheek and grabbed his collar. Thomas went in for the kiss, but Richard held him off.

“Let me look at you,” he said. “I want to see you.”

“You already see me,” Thomas said. He was right, of course. Richard would see him forever; whatever happened, that would always be true.

It was such a beautiful day; at the end of May, hot and dry, no breeze to speak of, in the sheltered back garden. You only got a week of those in a year, with the grass so green and the roses unfurling themselves with all their young grace. The blanket on the ground covered in sandwich crumbs and a patch where the lemonade spilled. Mrs Patmore made the lemonade, but (and he thinks this is more important) Richard made the sandwiches.

-

He moves in with a large suitcase and a new hat in September. Richard sees him from the window, coming up the garden path, face for once easy to read. Richard’s stomach swoops low. His smile fizzes. He goes out too early and leans at the wall, door wide open beside him.

He could make speeches and quote poets or something. Could have recorded for posterity the sky (cloudless) the path (needing raking) the bare hand clutching the case, the whole scene.

But all that is absolutely not important.

Just like that, hey? Who knew. Space shared. The house has been going from _his_ to _theirs_ from the moment Richard opened the door three years ago. And now that process is finished and whatever is going to replace it has started.

Richard takes a risk and embraces him on the threshold. A pleasant resistance to the two of them stepping over it together. Push through the membrane; see what’s on the other side. Thomas takes a deep breath. Here’s an ending. Here’s to the new beginning.

“Welcome home.” Richard says.

Thomas, foolish, purposeful, takes his hand before the door is closed behind them.


	2. Bonus!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> alternate ending!!!!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is supplementary! if you prefer this one, then take it as the real secret ending (tm) if not, thanks for sticking with me and try to enjoy it anyway? (??????)

“I won’t have us – together, us, two men who love each other - I _will not_ have us broken up by them _._ I won’t, Richard.”

“It isn’t up to you!” Richard shouts. And there it is. “It’s never _fucking_ been up to you!”

“So, what, we have no say in this?” Thomas says, and with a thrill he realises he believes what he’s saying, not in the way he usually does, either, he knows that it’s true, that it’s right. “No say at all about what we get?”

“What would we tell the neighbours?” Richard says, turning from the curtains over the kitchen sink window and looking at him again. “What story could possibly hold up? Why would you come here? When there’s no jobs, and no money, and I’m outside of the city, and all? What reason could you have for shacking up?”

-

The family didn’t really care, per se, if Thomas had the time. And as it turned out, he didn’t, and had to work longer the next day – Oh, Barrow won’t mind, he can take the children out to visit the pigs – Barrow had quite a lot of things to do, that day, but never mind, and God forbid they _listen_ to him – _Carson_ never minded about this kind of thing… (the fact that Carson had _more_ than _two_ maids, one of whom is only working half-days, and the other totally inexperienced, and certainly not in it for longer than it took to get some savings together…) And Thomas is _not_ Carson, either, he does not aim to be the platonic ideal of "Butler"; Carson didn’t know what a platonic ideal was, because there was no need for him to know it. Thomas, incredibly, at forty: thinking, _I know there is more to life than this._

He wishes he’d planned properly for it. He thought he’d be dead at thirty-five. Every year since has felt like a miracle. He now realises that he’s potentially got another whole life ahead of him now. It makes him feel sick.

No, it doesn’t. The optimist inside him – clearly the most stubborn part of his whole self, seeing as Murphy’s Law has decided to use his life as a case study more often than not – gently points out the inconsistencies in the argument. Being depressed was all very well and good when he was a good-looking twenty-three-year-old but now he’s old and nobody wants to see it anymore. There’s nothing grand and tragic about a greying, middle-aged invert feeling sad all the time.

If someone described Richard as a greying sad middle-aged invert Thomas would make sure they’d regret it.

Love never seemed durable to Thomas until he felt it settle in his own chest; it was incredible. If he’d known, back then, when he’d first seen Richard turn slightly, backlit by the window – but he had known, hadn’t he, he’d known that there was something. But for that to turn into this – to have a say in what went in which flowerbeds or if the blue rug was better in the hall or in the bedroom. To have Richard turn his head up towards him, expecting a kiss. To have someone waiting, wanting his letters.

-

Hands, the first time. On his skin they’d been hot. They’d – just at the top of the back of his thighs, in his 35 years he had never been touched there by anyone not wielding a wooden spoon – he’d never – Thomas had traced his hand down across Richard’s cheek (still, at that time, thinking of him as Mr Ellis, which is funny to him now and would have been then if he’d stopped to think about it) and down, lightly, the side of his neck, down to his armpit, and Richard had breathed out all at once and brought their mouths together again.

His lips – new – had been soft and his teeth had clicked Thomas’ and it had hurt a bit. Overeager. Like Thomas himself. Their pale skin. Richard had gripped tight onto Thomas’ wrist, and Thomas linked his other hand with Richard’s and pressed it to his hip, only his hip, and Richard broke the kiss and Thomas said _oh my God,_ and Richard had laughed, but they were being quiet, so it came out as hot breath against Thomas’ mouth. He’d had nights that were more together. Certainly, he’d had kisses with less saliva. But the moon shone through the window. It was a face, it was gazing down, Thomas was happy, and he didn’t care.

They came down to breakfast the next day, the closest Thomas ever came to flouting anything and he’d thought _hands,_ as Richard’s smirk met his, and he had been giddy. Positively giddy – he was silly with it. And then suddenly worn out with how sharp everything had been, and he’d had to sit down before he cried. His face had been sore, he remembered. When Richard had come in to kiss him again, with the door wide open.

  
  


I won’t lose you to this. I will not lose you to the effort of hiding, I won’t do it. I won’t, I won’t, I won’t, I will beat them in the end, I will beat them.

  
  


Thomas wakes up.

“Richard,” he says. Richard isn’t there. Thomas gets up, his pyjamas hanging off him, puts his robe on, feeling tall, and slowly goes to look through the empty house to try and find him. The trees through the window are as still as cement. Everything is silent. His bare feet are jackboot-loud on the floor. The door in the kitchen is open. It’s a warm night, but was does that mean in York? The moon is bright. Richard’s shoulders shake.

He is sitting in the garden alone, dressing gown belted tightly around his stomach. Thomas waits in the doorframe. He won’t, doesn’t, can’t, shan’t, (all the modals) speak. The trees that are so tall around the garden are a black line across the sky, peaks and valleys, the birds are loud, when he was young he’d sometimes be walking back to his parent’s house drunk and the birds would tell him he was too late coming back, it’s a bright still night and Richard has bright slippy tears on his face.

Breath, breath, breath. Thomas reaches into his pocket and pulls out a cigarette. Pulls out matches, the sudden strike and hiss shocking in the silent blue night. The crackle of the cigarette burning on his inhale. Exhale, smoke curls and twists. Thomas doesn’t follow it. His eyes are tired and lined and fixed. Fixed on Richard, who does not wipe the tears, turning towards from Thomas from a low angle, an inverse portrait from the first time Thomas knew.

“I can’t _work out_ how to bring you here,” he says. “You deserve this.”

There are better things to do with your time than cry in the garden. There are easier ways to go about this. Why didn’t you wake me up, do you not trust me? Am I not enough, here?

“I’ll help you.” Thomas says. “What else am I for?”

“I don’t want you to feel that way. You’re for more than helping other people with their problems, you know.”

-

What if you die tomorrow and we never got what we deserved. You know it’s nearly my mother’s anniversary, I’m as old as she was when she died, we had such plans me and her and then she found out, and she got cancer, and she died.

I’ve never been free in my life. Look at me; look at what that kind of imprisonment can do to a person.

-

Richard inhales.

-

The funeral was a long time coming. Thomas sits there and listens to Mrs Hughes – Elsie, maybe, now – as she goes over what she needs to do now that it’s all over, adding logistical suggestions, making a careful and clear list.

She’s typical about it. Contained, efficient, restrained, seeing some of the humour in the situation. He thinks that it’s admirable but not necessary.

“I lived my life so long without this,” she says, “I don’t know why I can’t go back just the way it was. But when I think about it, it just seems so empty.”

Thomas knows what she means.

-

Goodbye house, he thinks. I am never coming back.

He walks to the station.

He'll just play it by ear. Not in prison yet. He’s not going to live as if he is, anymore.

Richard, he thinks, I am coming home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so I have lost the draft for the ending of the Brancaster AU. I named it something really stupid and hid it in a different folder to what I normally use (WHY DID I DO THAT) but in the course of looking for that (WHERE ARE YOU) I found the original ending for Soundings, which as you can see was less enjoyable than the published version and was aptly entitled "sad emoji.docx" so.
> 
> What a FOOL am I. But hey, I'll publish it anyway. Maybe it'll offer some motivation. Fs in the chat for the lost Brancaster ending, I can't remember what I wanted to do with it.
> 
> my tumblr is [@meryton-etc](https://meryton-etc.tumblr.com/).

**Author's Note:**

> my tumblr is [@meryton-etc](https://meryton-etc.tumblr.com/).


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